


love lays here

by kittybenzedrine



Category: Umbrella Academy
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Denial, Graphic Description of A Body, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2015-02-06
Packaged: 2018-03-08 07:26:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3200582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kittybenzedrine/pseuds/kittybenzedrine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three weeks after Ben goes missing,-</p><p> </p><p>  <em>missing, only missing. he's not dead. he refuses to even let that dirty word touch his tongue for once. death is horrible. it can't happen to Ben, not Ben. Ben's not dead. not Ben, not his sweet, loving Ben</em></p><p> </p><p>-Klaus clears his head just enough to realize he wants another tattoo.</p>
            </blockquote>





	love lays here

**Author's Note:**

> Title and idea loosely based on this lovely fanart.
> 
> http://rikako-chan.deviantart.com/art/Love-Lays-Here-183989518
> 
> Edit: The lovely artists saw and read this, and here's the redraw that they did!
> 
> http://hopaiskalos.tumblr.com/post/110961956232

Three weeks after Ben goes missing,-

_missing, only missing. he's not dead. he refuses to even let that dirty word touch his tongue for once. death is horrible. it can't happen to Ben, not Ben. Ben's not dead. not Ben, not his sweet, loving Ben_

-Klaus clears his head just enough to realize he wants another tattoo.

Before he can forget, he grabs a sharpie from his bedside table and staggers to his bathroom. He hasn't left his bed in two days, and his knees are stiff.

(Empty alcohol bottles are meant to be pissed in, okay? Allison came in his room to say something and seen his copious amounts of piss-bottles and just shut the door. She knew that he and Vanya had taken it the hardest. She just left him cope how he needed.)

It's hard to do in the mirror, but he takes his handheld mirror and checks it out when he finished. It takes a bit to get the two mirrors to cooperate to where he can read it forwards, but he decides it looks okay.

He's still a little south of sober when he puts the black ink on his chest, but for the first time since he's seventeen, he decides to get completely clean until he gets the tat. He's heard that when you get tattoos whilst drunk, they don't heal properly and you bleed more. He wants this one to be good.

_he hears a soft voice pleading with him over the thick static of the dead in his head, begging him to stop, to listen. it's been there for three weeks now, and they're simultaneously the kindest and cruelest spirit that's ever come to him. he reminds Klaus that he needs to eat, to get up before he pisses the bed, not to take that much, don't mix those with alcohol or you'll vomit blood. they're cruel, because they also claim to be Ben but that's silly, because his brother/ best friend/ boyfriend/ lover isn't dead, he's just missing._

 

 

He takes his first shower in a week, and he's quite frankly very disgusted with himself. He's greasier than a pan of bacon, and has a thick layer of dead skin coating his body. There's dirt and grit in all of the creases on his body, his hair is nearly dripping with oils, and he's not willing to get his nose anywhere near his pits.

He has to wash his hair four times before it feels normal, and he globs on enough conditioner to choke a man. He scrubs his body until its red, being careful not to wash away the marker. He shaves away all the hair that's accumulated over the past week, sans the hair on his head and his arm hair. He decides to shave his face when he gets out, not wanting to accidentally shave off part of a sideburn. Again.

The floor gets soaked when he gets out mid-shower to get his pumice stone from under the sink, and there is a shadow watching him from the corner of the bathroom. It looks concerned from the corner of his eye, but he can't tell for sure because he refuses to look at it.

It unsettles him when the dead watch him bathe, but oh well. He wonders, how many ghosts had seen the two of them under the hot spray, watched Klaus pin him to the wall and kiss him, press conditioner coated fingers into him, murmur encouragements, trade 'I-love-yous', make love to Ben against that wall-

He gets back in and scrubs his feet with the stone until the tears are from the pain in his feet instead of his chest.

_he dreams about Ben again and wakes up crying for him. a nearly transparent Ben is crouched next to his bed and he hears Ben whispering that it's okay to him through the radio static in his head and Klaus ignores it because Ben's not dead. he hears not-Ben pleading with him again but he rolls over and faces the wall and ignores it when a human shaped coldness envelopes his body, exactly the way Ben would hold him. it whispers right in his ear but he just curls himself in a ball and covers both ears._

 

 

Hargreeves asks him where he thinks he's going when he sees the redhead, and Klaus flips him off and slams the front door behind himself. He's a grown man, he can do whatever the fuck he wants to do. He doesn't need daddy dearest's permission for jack-shit anymore. It's bright outside and his withdrawals are kicking his ass, and his mood is getting progressively worse as the spirit continues to yank at his mental coattails.

The guy at the tattoo parlor is large and tatted up, and scarier than the guy that did his hands. He gives off a strong air of 'ex-con', but Klaus can't bring himself to care. Big and scary asks him for his ID, and when it checks out, Klaus shows the man the faded sharpie on his chest. The artist is even more skeptical by that point, but traces it onto the special paper and then makes Klaus go scrub away every trace of the marker in the bathroom.

_not-Ben asks, than begs him as he lays down, shirt off, not to do this. Klaus is offended when not-Ben calls him Klausy-Cloud, because that's what real-Ben calls him, but he can do nothing about it. not-Ben lets out a ghostly sob and it chills him to the bone. he does his best to block out the impostor's voice, his begging and pleading, and he's grateful when it finally falls silent._

The man retraces Klaus' own handwriting back onto his chest, low on his left pectoral, and asks him if he's ready. Klaus tells him yes, and closes his eyes while the artist works his magic.

It stings, but not nearly as bad as his hands had. Less bones, he guesses, and his pain tolerance is much better. He can see the ghostly shadow standing next to him, and his right hand is ice cold. It only takes about half an hour, but the ghost stays next to him, and he can't feel his fingers by the end of it. Spector must think it's hurting him.

He makes the mistake of glancing over to his right, at one point. The ghost looks like he's on the verge of tears, and he looks so much like Ben that Klaus has to bite his cheek to keep himself under control. It even looks like he's wearing Ben's favorite moss green sweater, the one that Klaus has already had to repair the shoulders on four times.

When it's all over with, he gets the rundown of how to take care of it while it gets bandaged. He puts his shirt on and pays the guy, and goes back home. He ignores the newly finished statue of Ben in all of his caped, tentacled glory and goes inside. No one asks where he went, and he's plenty fine with that. He snags some of the lunch mom had made from the kitchen and scarfs it down, not realizing how hungry he'd been.

He snorts three neat lines of coke off of his bedside table and takes a muscle relaxer to calm his shaking hands, and finally collapses into his bed. He has a deep, dreamless sleep, and wakes at roughly 1AM, groggy and disoriented.

 

 

He moves mechanically, his brain on autopilot. He moves everything out of the way, reducing any fire risk. And also cleaning the clothes from his floor for the first time in two months. A ring of white candles are set up on the floor, and his favorite Ouija board placed in the center. It's just past 2 in the morning when all the candles are lit and he's sitting in the center.

He knows spirits are strongest and most active between 12 and 3, and bides his time until the more vivid version of the ghost sits in front of him. He still refuses to look up at him.

"Ben? You here with me?" He asks, placing his hands on the planchette, and he watches the figure lean in and place both hands over his own. They go straight through, but have no trouble dragging the small piece of wood to the 'YES' on the board.

He sighs to himself, feeling his chest seize up. Not-Ben lets out his own sigh, pulling the planchette to 'HELLO'.

His voice comes in, less static, more solid. "I, I don't, heck. I don't know why you can't see or, or hear me," he says quietly, and Klaus knows he's waiting for a question to answer.

Klaus doesn't give him one. He knows not-Ben is watching him shake and suppress sobs, watching him struggle to keep from collapsing in on himself.

It takes a moment for it to register in his head when the planchette starts to move again.

_I M I S S Y O U_

He stares as it it moves back to the center, and not-Ben starts to babble again.

"God, Klaus, please, just, just talk to me. I miss you so much. I'm so lonely, and watching you all but kill yourself hurts so bad. I just, I miss your voice, and-"

Not-Ben moves the planchette again.

_I L O V E Y O U_

"-and it's so hard without you. I don't even remember dying, just me and Space, and then he yelled something, then everything was just darkness, and finally I woke up and knew I needed to see you, and-"

"Stop."

The spirit falls silent and moves the planchette back to the center of the board, abandoning whatever he'd begun to spell out. Klaus digs his nails into his crossed legs, head bowed.

"Fuck you. I just, you promised. You promised, you fucking asshole."

He hears not-Ben sniffle and let out a pained, "Jesus Klausy-Cloud, why can't you hear me?"

Klaus tenses further. He's shaking hard. "You promised, when I stopped you in the hall before you left. Fucking, let me lift up your mask, and I kissed you twice, once on the forehead and once on the lips. I didn't blot my lipstick, so it left marks."

He hunches over himself, forcing tears down. "You wiped off the one on your mouth, but, fuck, I told you to keep the one on your forehead, for, for good luck or some shit, and you did." His breathing is quick and uneven, and the ghost in front of him is crying silent tears, his nails digging into his sweater.

His chest twists painfully. He'd seen the black smear on that pale forehead when they retrieved him, skin whiter than Klaus could have believed.

"You pulled your stupid mask back on and I told you that I loved you, and you said it back, and then _you promised_."

Her grits his teeth as he struggles to get his breathing under control. He swipes away the tears cutting down his gaunt cheeks, and cringes when the spirit lets out a soft, broken whisper of, "Klaus..."

He snaps his head up, looking directly into those ghostly emerald eyes. "You promised me you'd come back!"

Ben stares at him, ghostly mouth moving with silent words, transparent eyes full of tears.

Klaus hunches over and lets out a shaky breath, fighting the tears in his eyes while his lip wobbles. "You said you'd come back to me, and then you fucking died."

He looks up, and fuck, Ben's crying even more. He wants so badly to reach out and brush those tears away and kiss him, but he can't.

"I'm sorry," Ben tells him, voice cracking. "I'm so sorry Klaus."

Ben waits for Klaus to speak again, but he doesn't, just sits hunched over, shaking with repressed sobs.

"Klaus," he says softly, and waits for the redhead to look back up at him. He wipes translucent tears from his see-through skin. "I... I need you to make peace with me."

Klaus' brows furrow, and his throat tightens to the point where he can barely speak. He asks, though he doesn't want to know the answer. "Peace for what?"

Ben looks away. His face twists painfully before he looks back up. "So I can move on."

They look away at the same time. Ben takes a deep, shaky breath and carries on. "Before I can move on, I have to make amends with all of my regrets, and this is my last one."

At that, Klaus snaps to attention. If it were possible for him to look any more heartbroken, it was done. Every awful thing he's ever said or done to Ben runs through his mind, and he wonders if it's true that you can die from a broken heart. "I'm... A regret?"

"No, Klaus. Not you, never you," He says softly, but surely. "My promise is the regret. I promised you I'd come back, but I didn't. At least, not the way you wanted me to." He slouches over, wracked with guilt.

Klaus remembers the way Ben looked when they brought the body home. Mask gone, with a smeared black kiss on his forehead. His once green eyes, still half open, clouded blue, with those long white lashes framing them. Lips that had been pale pink, parted and without an ounce of color. Skin so pale, cold as ice, god, fresh snow had more color.

And God, the sheer amount of blood still on him. Dried around his mouth, all over his torn open stomach, cape, and bottoms. Christ, he didn't even want to begin to remember seeing Ben's insides. Apparently whoever had brought the body was kind enough to tuck his intestines back into his body.

His skin no longer moved and writhed, the monsters having abandoned their dead host. Klaus had never seen Ben's skin so still before. He couldn't tear his eyes away. It was the first time he'd ever felt, no pun intended, horrified to see a dead body.

He shakes the memory away. "Will... Will you still be able to come see me?" Klaus asks, suddenly and very painfully regretting his decision to ignore his love for the past three weeks.

Ben tilts his head up enough to make eye contact, and he looks so pitiful that Klaus wants to kiss it away. "I really don't know, Klaus."

The ginger wrings his hands as he looks over to the digital clock on his nightstand. 2:27.

"I got a tattoo," he says suddenly.

"I know. I held your hand."

That draws a quirk of the lips from Klaus. "I thought so. My fingers were blue by the time I got up."

He looks up, and Ben is giving him a watery smile.

"I really love you, Ben," he says, and Ben could tell just from his eyes how sincere he was. "I really, really, really love you. I, I really regret not telling you that more when I had the chance."

Klaus pauses for a moment, collecting his thoughts before carrying on.

"And... I've been selfish my whole life, and don't tell me I haven't been. I know I'm selfish, and I'm sorry. But... no matter how much I'll miss you, I'm not going to keep you here for me. I guess, by all technicalities, you did come back to me. You're right, you didn't come back how I wanted you to, but you came back, nonetheless. I have no reason to be upset at you. You have nothing to regret, babe." He scrubs at his wet eyes, looking up at the white haired man still sitting before him.

"Just promise me one thing, okay?"

Ben nods. "Anything."

"Come and see me if you can, okay?"

The ghost nods. "I swear to you, if I can, I will. And Klaus?"

He wipes his eyes harder than necessary, a few dark red lashes coming away on his hands. "Yeah?"

"I really, really, really love you too. A whole lot."

Their eyes meet, and though Klaus is crying, Ben can see him smiling behind the hand covering his mouth.

Slowly, Ben stands. His face is clear of tears, and he looks... Peaceful. "I think it's time for me to go."

Klaus stands with him and bows his head, struggling to clear his throat enough to speak. He feels an icy touch at his cheek and looks up. Ben gives him a gentle smile. Tears cut cold tracks down Klaus' face as he gives Ben the best smile he can.

"I love you so much, Klaus," he says softly, and Klaus chokes out another sob, turning his head away just long enough to stifle it.

"I love you so much too, Ben," he chokes out, and smiles back at him again. He closes his eyes as Ben leans in, and he feels the cold freeze of ghostly lips on his own.

He hears a soft whisper of "Goodbye," and when he opens his eyes, Ben is gone.

A soft gust of wind swirls through the room, blowing the candles out. Klaus collapses to his knees, fingers digging into the carpet, and lets it all out.

 

 

Once he exhausts himself and nothing else comes, he climbs to his feet. His face and chest hurt, and he can't breathe through his stuffy nose. The light of his bathroom is too bright when he turns it on, and he squints as he stumbles to the sink.

As he washes his puffy, red face, he reflects on the fact that Ben's probably never coming back. It hurts to think, and nearly causes him to break down again, but the look on Ben's face said it all. He was at peace, and Klaus wasn't going to steal that away from him. He wasn't going to be selfish this time.

He peels off his shirt and pats his face dry with it. As he tosses it to the floor, he sees the bandage on his chest, noting that the tat has begun to ache again. Ever-so-gently, he pulls the tape and gauze away, starting at the small black lines on his chest. Though he sees it backwards in the mirror, he knows it's perfect.

It's small enough that he can cover it with three fingers, if he really wanted to. He doesn't want to. It sits low on his left pectoral, around where he estimated the bottom of his heart to be.

It's only three simple words, stacked on top of each other, pulsing with each heart beat. Klaus smiles at it, knowing the words are true.

_Here lies Ben_

**Author's Note:**

> This was really hard to write because I'm a 100% firm believer that Ben isn't actually dead. As Klaus himself said, "I have a couple theories..."
> 
> AND I DON'T THINK ANY OF YOU UNDERSTAND HOW HARD I CRIED WHILE WRITING THE END. I ACTUALLY HAD TO STOP A FEW TIMES BECAUSE I COULDN'T SEE.


End file.
